The company pulled back the curtain on 2012 Topps Five Star Baseball on Monday, a new high-end brand that will pack two autographs, one autographed Relic, one autographed booklet or extra autograph and a jumbo Relic, bat nameplate or bat knob card in every single box.

Of the standard autographs, one will be of an active player and one will be of a retired star with every card in the product signed directly on the cards themselves, not stickers.

Five Star is set to arrive on Oct. 31 and it will pack a high-end price. Factory cost for three-box cases of the product are starting north of $1,000, so a $400- to $500-per-pack cost should be expected.

See more after the jump.

Autographs
For the autograph lineup, there will be as many as 40 active players signing for the product with each card numbered to 150 or less. These cards will have Rainbow parallels numbered to 25. Quotable Autographs will include an inscription from some of the players and will be limited to just 10 copies. For retired players, there will be as many as 30 past stars in the product, each limited to 208 or less with Rainbows to 25 and inscriptions to 10.

Among the active players set to sign for the product, according to a preliminary checklist, are just four rookies — Brett Lawrie, Yu Darvish, Matt Moore and Yoenis Cespedes. Notable veterans will include Cy Young winners Clayton Kershaw and Justin Verlander along with Matt Kemp, Evan Longoria, Prince Fielder, Ryan Braun, Albert Pujols, Josh Hamilton, Roy Halladay, Mike Trout, Buster Posey, Chipper Jones and Jose Bautista to name a few.

Autographed Relics
The standard Five Star Autograph Relics will be numbered to 97 or less with as many as 40 players showcased. They will have Gold parallels limited to 55, Rainbows to 25. Patches will be limited to five copies.

For the autographed Relics, it’s a bit younger crop of new and old players with some of the notable signers including Bryce Harper, Kemp, Kershaw, Lawrie, Verlander, Hamilton, Felix Hernandez, Carlton Fisk, Tony Gwynn, George Bell, Cecil Cooper, Pablo Sandoval, Bautista, Moore, Sandberg and Frank Thomas to name a few.

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Autographed booklets
First there will be the Three-piece Signature Booklets limited to 99 or less, while Golds will be limited to 10 and Rainbow patches will be 1/1s. Also to hunt for will be four-piece Relics with the same quantities and Jumbo Relic booklets, too. They will have the same breakdown. Five Star Dual Signatures booklets will have as many as 30 pairs with both players signing. These will be limited to 10 or fewer copies, while patch versions also will be limited to 10.

As many as 10 Five Star Cut Signatures booklets will be made — all 1/1s — while Five Star Quadographs will group four players and four autos per card. Those will be limited to 10, whole the six- and eight-signature versions will be limited to five apiece.

Rounding out the booklets will be Dual Signatures Logo Patches — the MLB logo from the back of the jersey — pairing as many as 50 total players on as many as 25 cards with each signed and 1/1s.

Signers here tentatively include Darvish, Don Mattingly, Rickey Henderson, Dennis Eckersley, Griffey — and his father — Nolan Ryan, Sandberg, Banks, Fielder and many of the previous signers. Patch booklets are planned for many of the players including pairings of Braun-Kemp, Kemp-Andre Ethier, McCovey-Posey, Harper-Ryan Zimmerman, Harper-Darvish, Darvish-Hamilton and more.

Dual logoman cards are planned for Pujols with Mike Trout, Kemp and Kershaw, Hamilton and Darvish, Harper and Zimmerman to name a few.

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Jumbo jerseys and patches
First, there will be active player Jumbo Jersey Relics for as many as 50 players — each limited to 92 or less — with Gold parallels limited to 25 and 1/1 Rainbow Jumbo Patch cards for as many as 30 of the players.

Then, there will be Letters patches (50 cards) with game-used letters — each 1/1s — along with Legends Relics for 25 players each limited to just 25. Beyond that, there will be Dual Legends Relics limited to 10, Dual Patches and Triple Patches Quad Patches limited to five. Also in there will be Quad Patch booklets (limited to five), 1/1 bat nameplates and 1/1 bat knobs.

Among the Relic players not previously mentioned will be World Series MVP David Freese, Curtis Granderson, Cliff Lee, Tim Lincecum and Stephen Strasburg to name a few, while Legends Relics will feature Roberto Clemente, Ripken, Harmon Killebrew, Willie Mays, Jackie Robinson, Babe Ruth, Mickey Mantle, Stan Musial, George Brett, Joe DiMaggio and many others.

Five Star Club
Lastly, Topps is introducing the launch of the Five Star Club with the product, what it bills as “an exclusive club that provides year-round benefits for select collectors” and comes with a personalized membership card, “exclusive Five Star Football and Baseball cards, a quarterly call with Topps employees and VIP Status at national events that Topps attends.”

39 Comments

Richard

So, will the “relic” have the current disclaimer that states it’s not necessarily
from an actual game? If I got a bat knob of DiMaggio and they use the typical
weasel words I’d not be happy.

I want something along the lines of, This bat know comes from a bat certified
to have been used by Joe DiMaggio in an official major league game. I’d prefer
it to refer to an actual season if possible. A picture of the item before it was
chopped up would also be nice.

When they use weasel words I just assume its a manufactured piece of crap
with no actual connection to the player named on the card.

In any case, I’d have to see the complete list, but it looks like something that
might be close to break even on many of the boxes if its in the sub $400 range.
I just hope that they don’t mess up the cards putting them into the box and
that they don’t put out too many boxes where 3 of the 4 cards end up sucking.
(Unless its packed with the Ruth cut. With that, you could give me 3 cards that
were just blank decoys and I would not care.)

I don’ think it is a bad idea if you can afford it. If someone wants to spend $400 on a pack of this, or $400 on 4 jumbo boxes of Topps Series 2, who’s to judge? Of course, you have to have the $400 first one way or the other.

The cards sound and look awsome and should be worth the price, it just seems to me that they are doing the same sort of stuff that killed the hobby in he 90’s , sell high end cards at a high price so that when dealers buy they hope to break even , which means the collector will expect to break even on their investment , there for killing the excitment of a small investment that may turn big but even if it doesnt you dont care because it was a SMALL investment , I dont think you should have to pay $400.00 to get a chance at getting a $200.00 card

Love the product. A little expensive for me, but I can save up for it. I sure hope there is no Angel Pagan, Ian Kennedy, Drew Stubbs, or Trevor Cahill. Definitely looking forward to it. But I have a question… is it gonna be a rookies product? If it’s like the football brand, in every case there would be a Taiwan Jones, Leonard Hankerson, Jordan Todman, or Bilal Powell. If not, I think I’ll love it!

Soooooo, if Topps puts out a 5-Star set with so many awesome players loaded into the mix, are they admitting that everything else is 4-Star and below? Maybe rank the new Gypsy Queen a 1-Star product, Heritage a 4 Star product and so forth? Just a thought.

To think that since Series 1 and up until now, all the money I’ve spent on Topps cards….Maybe next year they’ll not get a cent from me and I’ll just stash the thousands of dollars I’ve spent this year in anticipation of another super high-end product! That way I could get multiple cases of this instead of cases of duplicates with 4-star or less players! Now I know, and knowing is only half the battle…..G.I.Joe!!!!!!!!!

I love Five Star Football and have been excited about seeing Five Star Baseball ever since i heard about it coming out during the Summit and after seeing these pics i am not dissapointed! I think the cards look amazing! I know the price is high and not everybody can afford it but the people that cant afford it, they can just buy the singles they want on the secondary market and the Box Buster junkies like myself can put back some money here and there until October and buy a box or 2 (hopefully) and hope for the best. Thats whats so fun about this great hobby of ours! Thanks for the pics Chris!

Will it even be worth putting out the $500 for a pack? There are other nice high end products on the market but the hits can be purchased for $20-$100. (Tribute and 3xthreads). I do like having the autos on card though. SO much better than that sticker crap.

There is a place for high-end products in the hobby but there are way too many of them. Relics do nothing for me; however, autographs and cut signatures is what high end should be about.

I would rather see higher quality low-end and middle of the road products that people can buy at retail. The fun part of card collecting used to buying a bunch of boxes trying to find that one hit or watching rookie cards rise and fall in value.I would rather own my elite series hits from early 1990’s than pay $500 for a high-end product. As long as there is a market for end-high the companies should produce the products to stay in business but I would rather see Topps rework Topps Opening Day, bring back Stadium Club, and continue to produce products like Chrome.

I wouldn’t even think about buying a box of this. It doesn’t matter how nice they look or what I could POSSIBLY pull. I can buy a mid-range box of each of the 3 sports I collect for about half that box price and still pull some really good cards. In this case, I’ll take quantity over quality.

Product looks beautiful. While most people can not afford this product, Beckett Poll shows about 68% say they find the product appealing. Looks like Five Star singles should sell well on eBay. If box busters do well selling singles, they will bust more boxes.

My only concern is that Topps may over-produce this product. And, given Topps policy to produce to pre-order demand (hobby shop, distributer, internet retailers) this is a real possibility. Topps distribution policy is an added problem. When product gets in the hands of retailers who can’t afford to sit on product they over-ordered (bought more than they can sell or pre-sale in a few weeks) from Topps, they sell it at loss, giving the perception to the buying public that the product is “bad.”

its like triple threads and museum had a baby….. cant say i like it all that much. im sure i will end up purchasing a box or 3, but ill hate myself for it and wont pull anything that i PC. I WILL SAY THIS, the auto line up with brett, ryan, mattingly…. brings me back to the 80s when i was a little kid practicing my autograph on random donruss and fleer common cards. lol.

What Beckett should get from Topps and what Topps should do is name the crap players that signed or release a FULL checklist before launch. Then we could decide for ourselves if there’s a good chance for a return on our investment. It’s totally misleading to showcase the best cards and highlight the most popular players when the chances of getting either might be slim to none.

With this product, that can’t be the case, not for $400+/box. But as Topps and Panini have proved, price doesn’t guarantee quality.

what i worry about is that like some recent product the hype was there but the product fell way shot, i hope this is not one of those dump every left over into it, i see the ad, but i’ve seen them before. i can name 2 so far this year but we all know them so enough said, i like the 5 star brand, and i think it has the players in baseball to make it an multi year product, but the price, mite set some collectors in other direction’s, maybe they should start it outr a little cheaper maybe 250.00 a box, most will just wait and buy there player or team on line, i would guess

Josh: I have the full preliminary checklist. We don’t post them because they inevitably change before the product comes out. The checklists in the system on Beckett.com are based on the FINAL checklists.

Chris, why don’t you print the preliminary with
a nice big disclaimer at the top and bottom to warn people that it is likely to change.
I’m sure lots of us would appreciate it just to figure out the preliminary odds of getting
good vs not so good cards. If it looks bad, people complain (or don’t order) and Topps
has an incentive to juice it up a bit to make it more palatable.

Thing is, while I can imagine being happy with a David Friese 1 of 1 card, I’d be less so with
one #’d to 50 given the average cost/card. While a Koufax auto card can be #’d to 250 and
I would still have a smile.

The only reason my opinion is of import here is relative to my likelihood to buy,
not that it will realistically change things.

My biggest concern has to do with the numbering.
If the better players are #’d low and the less popular # to 208, I see a blood bath.

The Yu Darvish cards will be very popular. Many other cards I do not note will do OK,
but will not contribute enough to offset the cost. At the case level the #’s do improve
since the cost per pack drops significantly.

If they do a proper COA for the material, I see it being even better.
A lame COA on material which guarantees nothing will really hurt this for me and more
finicky collectors like me. I will not them, period. This is sad since the design looks
nice to me.

Final judgement withheld until I see the final list and the COA.
Done right and its a buy under $400 per pack. Done a bit better and it might even be
worth the $500. Done wrong and it becomes a buy only the key cards on secondary
market type item since the odds are too long with that any pack will pay off.

Nice looking set. As a set collector doesn’t appeal as much to me as I am not out for big hits. Like all high end products, high risk, high reward. My guess is after the initial release the prices will drop. I think $400 – 500 a pack is a big risk for people looking to make money off their hits.

Hasn’t Topps looked at the economy lately? People are struggling to keep their jobs and their homes and Topps thinks there’s going to be a market for collectors who are willing to shell out north of $400.00 for a pack of baseball cards?!?!?

For $400-$500 a pack, it would have to promise me an authorized autograph of Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig in every pack before I’d consider it worthwhile.

Gambling on high-end products in the hopes of getting that one desirable card just isn’t worth it.

If you do the math, the chances are you’d do BETTER spending $1,000.00 buying low-end products such as Topps’ regular set Topps Chrome, and Opening Day than you would by spending $1,000.00 buying the expensive high-end stuff on the chance that you might get the rare “hot” card. Why? With Topps regular and Opening Day, you’ll get enough of the $10.00 and up cards to make it worth your while. With the expensive stuff, you MIGHT get the rare card that’ll make it worth your while, but you probably won’t. And most of the cards you’ll end up getting out of those high-end packs aren’t worth any more than the cards you get from regular Topps.

Last year, everyone was buying Gypsy Queen as soon as it hit the shops’ shelves because they wanted that rare card of William and Kate. How many people who paid and paid for those cards actually GOT the William and Kate they were after compared to how many were just disappointed?

A few years ago, how many people were ignoring every other card release because they were gobbling up Bowman’s in hopes of getting that Stephen Strasburg card that was selling on ebay for $30,000.00? How many people actually GOT that Strasburg card?

Man, Ive been drooling for two days now, and can finally speak! These cards have got me going like no other. I love it because Im all for Topps and want them more then anything to stick it to Panini. There are three cards in this set that would make my Collection/Life complete. The Babe book, Harper 3 color patch auto and Darvish auto patch just one of his the logo man would be top of the list but it will sell for 10-20 grand lol. But it looks like a hell of a product. I was lucky to hit a Cam Newton in this yrs football product on a break in Blogtv, so dont sweat it guys you’ll be able to join breaks and have just a good a s chance as buying a 500 dollar box. Alot of whinners on here, yes the economy is down, but its like 5 months away, start saving!!! I know I am for sure!! If I had 3 thumbs id put them all up Topps!! Beautiful and amazing product cant wait to open a box!!! Love it!! Hate on Haters

This reminds me of National Treasures Football…except NT gives you A LOT more cards. Each card would have to net $75+ just to have you break even. That being said, people who buy this product may wish to make a profit. Just manage your expectations. Just as with any other product, the profit just isn’t there. I will be buying this product with the expectation that I may only recoup 1/3rd of what I spend, if that.

Mel G, you may be right about the odds of recovering your money or getting that big hit, but what the heck am I gonna do with the amount of cards I get with $1,000 worth of Topps Chrome or Opening Day? I’d be buried in cards and it would take DAYS to organize it. Not worth the hassle. Also, it’s much easier to sell 3 high end cards than it is to sell 5,000 common cards.

What scares me is Im a sucker for old retirees. I would try to do my best to buy a pack cause of many children and bills my collecting is limited. What scares me is buying a pack and I’m stuck with Chili Davis or one of the rooks who will fizzle out. I of course love that your guarenteed autos and such but my whole collecting career I buy a hobby box for a bill and get a crap load of nice base cards and an auto of Carlos Gomez. However this actually gives me hope of landing an Aaron or Ruth. Which would kill me in a good way.